Hands-On With Cars Mater-National

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McQueen is back, and he means business.

By Bozon

During the Wii's launch THQ supported the system with a few of its stronger licensed products, one of them being Cars Mater-National. Based on the Disney Pixar movie, Cars was developed by Rainbow studios, known for their success with the MX vs. ATV franchise. It was a licensed game, but it fit its demographic well, offering an entertaining motion-based design that gave younger gamers a racing experience that they could identify with. It was far from perfect, but it was fun, and a solid effort.

Now nearly a year later THQ is teaming up with Rainbow Studios once again, this time delivering another Cars experience to younger Wii owners. In Cars Mater-National, players can explore Radiator Springs once again, this time including all the content of the previous games, as well as new racers, some new tracks, and monster truck versions of their favorite Cars characters. It isn't entirely fresh, but if you've yet to pick up the original, Mater-National is the previous game and then some. We had a chance to drive a few laps with the racer, and it's exactly as we remembered it; simple, but fun.

#95 is back for a few more laps around the track.

Cars plays almost identical to how it did a year ago, and that is in no way a bad thing. Players boot up the game, can chose from multiplayer mini-games, quick races, or the full blown story mode, and then race around tons of tracks inspired by the Pixar movie. The core design is extremely simple-minded – for good reason – focusing on a classic tilt-to-drive control with the Wii-mote held like an NES controller. Depending on your racers, attributes will flux, so players will need to experiment with different Cars characters to find out which best suits their style.

For our hands-on playtest we had a chance to try out a few returning racers (Lightning McQueen and Sally Carrera to be exact), as well as take the new monster truck version of McQueen for a ride as well. The original cars handled identically to what we remembered, while the monster truck versions could push around other cars with ease but sacrificed some agility in the process. We didn't have a chance to take the monster trucks out onto the open road (staying within some enclosed tracks only), but we imagine they're far more at home in the jagged, open world; something that Cars boasts once again as a huge part of the game.

The boys of Radiator Spings show off some rockin' upgrades.

Aside from the new cars, most of our hands-on demo was identical to the original cars game. The visuals were on par with THQ's first effort, the cars handled exactly as we remembered, and even the interface was all-around the same. The somewhat basic trick system, allowing you to tip your car on two wheels or hop over small obstacles with a quick motion up on the Wii-mote was all in tact as well, so this experience will feel very familiar to anyone that already took the previous game for a few laps. At the same time, added cars and tracks should be enough to tide over younger Wii gamers, as long as parents don't mind dropping the extra dough.

We'll have more on Cars Mater-National as we near the game's release, so be sure to check back for more information, new media, and our final review shortly. Cars releases later this year on Wii, 360, PS3, PC, DS, and GBA.